Thursday, October 18, 2012

THE NIGHT BLOGGER: The Graveyard Game And Other Cemetery Plots part eight 'The Parliament Of Moloch'

October 16th: Three pepper sprayings and an arrest later I realized that there was no way I could get to the temple of Mormo myself. Part of me wanted to call Ashley Fowler and give her a piece of my mind between this and the night of the living dead snakes I was starting to suspect she was trying to sandbag me.

The temple of Mormo was somewhere in Charity House, a women’s shelter. Which is why my attempts to visit, and then my later attempts to break-in were met with such hostility.

So in the end I had no choice, I sent Sara...

THE NIGHT BLOGGER:

The Graveyard Game

And Other Cemetery Plots

part eight

The Parliament Of Moloch

by

Al Bruno III

"...My name is Sara Bishop, but if you’ve been following along you must already know that.

"Something else I want you to know; Brian didn’t make me do this any more than he made me play the Graveyard Game. I volunteered for all of it.

"Like Brian said we didn’t have much choice in the matter. There’s this presence in my head, it’s buried now but I can feel it digging to the surface. If we don’t hurry it will be me, and I won’t be anything.

"It wasn’t too hard for me to get admitted to Charity House, I’ve had more than my share of bad relationships, all I did was put them into one guy and exaggerate a little.

"There was something about Charity House that reminded me of junior high, it was the tiled hallways and the thick wooden doors. The woman in charge of the place was named Claudia, there was a tattoo of an owl on her neck. They gave me a room and told me the rules- no drugs or alcohol, no visitors and mandatory counseling sessions. Meal times were at nine, noon and seven.

"I spent the day getting settled and mingling. The staff were either my age or my Mom’s. I started to feel guilty about what I was doing, I felt like I was taking advantage of people just trying to do some good.

"It wasn’t until dinner time that I started to notice that all the staff had owl tattoos. Most had them on their arms but one girl had hers right behind her left ear. I almost didn’t see it.

"That reminded me of something from my Women’s Studies class. The owl was supposed to be the symbol of the goddess Minerva.

"I didn’t just wait until lights out, I waited until 2 a.m. before I started exploring. The whole time I laid there in that single bed biding my time I kept wondering what I had gotten myself into. And what had I let get into me? Whatever it was... I’d rather die than let it take over.

"Creeping through the hallways I held tight to the things Brian had given me; a box of wooden matches and a page from the Apocryphal Book Of Tobit. He told me to search places like the basement and the boiler room but for some reason I thought I’d have better luck if I checked the roof.

"The climb up the stairwell was nerve wracking, every step I made seemed twice as loud as it should have been, and it was cold, not the kind of cold that comes with Fall. This was more brutal like a February snowstorm. I was wearing a hoodie but I was still shivering. There was frost on the handrails and I could see my breath.

"The doorway to the roof was blocked off by a card table with a blanket thrown over it. It didn’t look like much of an altar but the statue in the center of the table looked like the real deal. I wasn’t surprised to see it was an owl.

"But it was the cruelest looking owl I had ever seen, everything about it looked sharp- the beak, the claws even the ridges of its feathers. The eyes were little black gems that had a light of their own. It looked like it was made from brass, I sure didn’t think it could ever burn but I did just what Brian told me.

"I put the page under the statue and lit it. It might have looked like metal but it melted liked it was made from ice. A few minutes was all it took. Once I was sure it was gone I started to head back down the stairs.

"Claudia and the other women of Charity House were waiting for me. If this had been a movie they would have attacked me right then and there, torn me limb from limb, but they just stared at me with these weird little smiles. I think I might have stood there all night, too afraid to move or even speak but then they all turned and went back the way they had come. Only Claudia waited behind.

"There was nothing else to do, I walked past her thinking that any moment she would pull out a knife and stab me in the back but all she did was whisper.

"'I know what you are.'

"Then she was gone too and I ran for my life..."

*

...I guess I should tell you that the owl isn’t just sacred to Minerva, it is also the symbol of a demon god called Moloch. And I bet you wouldn’t be surprised to learn that the female aspect of Moloch is called Mormo.Moloch again. Just what I needed.

None of this feels right. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad they didn’t hurt her, more glad than Sara will ever know. But why didn’t they? What are they planning? Is any of this really going to do any good?

Only one more temple to get rid of then and I guess I’ll know. Of course this one is a going to be a little diferent Ashley Fowler left me a special note about it.

About Me

Al Bruno III is a writer of comedy and horror with over twenty years experience crafting stories that are as unforgettable as they are strange. Or then again, maybe he's just another unpublished author with a blog.

PRICE BREAKS AND HEARTACHES VOLUME TWO

IN THE MIDNIGHT OF HIS HEART

IN THE SHADOW OF HIS NEMESIS

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